(soft violin music plays)
- Good evening, my name is Joey Batey,
and I play Jaskier in The Witcher.
Today I'm gonna be reading a segment
from the first "Witcher" book, "The Last Wish."
For those of you who have not read the books,
I think it's important that you know
that Jaskier's his name in the English book is Dandilion
know that, I guess.
Let's begin.
(low violin playing)
- [Reading] "Geralt! Hey! Are you there?"
He raised his head from the course yellowed pages
Of "History of the World," by Roderick de Novembre,
An interesting, if controversial book,
which he had been studying since the previous day.
- "Yes, I am."
"What's happened Nenneke? Do you need me?"
- "You've got a guest."
- "Again? Who is it this time,
Duke Herreward himself?"
- "No, it's Dandilion this time, your fellow."
"That idler parasite, and good for nothing."
"That priest of art, the bright shining star
of the ballad love poem."
"As usual, he's radiant with fame
puffed up like a pig's bladder and stinking with beer."
"Do you want to see him?"
- "Of course. He's my friend after all."
Nenneke, peeved, shrugged her shoulders.
- "I can't understand that friendship,
he's your absolute opposite."
- "Opposites attract."
- "Obviously. There, he's coming."
She indicated with her hand.
- "Your famous poet."
- "He really is a famous poet, Nenneke."
"Surely, you're not going to claim
you never heard his ballads?"
- "Oh, I've heard them," the priestess winced,
"Yes, indeed. Well, I don't know much about it,
but maybe the ability to jump from touching lyricism,
to obscenity so easily is a talent."
"Nevermind. Forgive me. But I won't keep you company."
"I'm not in the mood for either his poetry,
Or his vulgar jokes."
A peal of laughter, and a strumming of a lute
resounded in the corridor, and there,
on the threshold, of the library stood Dandilion,
in a lilac jerkin with lace cuffs,
his hat askew.
The troubadour bowed exaggeratedly at the sight of Nenekke.
The heron feather pinned to his hat, sweeping the floor.
- "My deepest respects, venerable mother,"
he whined, stupidly.
"Praise be the great Melitele, and her priestesses,
the springs of virtue and wisdom-"
- "Stop talking bullshit," Snorted Nenneke.
"And don't call me mother."
"The very idea that you could be my son
fills me with horror."
She turned on her heel and left, her trailing robe rustling.
Dandelion, aping her, sketched a parody bow.
- "She hasn't changed a bit," he said, cheerfully.
"She still can't take a joke."
"She's furious because I chatted a bit
to the gatekeeper when I got here,
a pretty blonde with long lashes
and virgin's plait reaching down
to her cute little bottom."
"Which, it would be a sin, not to pinch."
"So, I did and Nenneke, who had just arrived--
ah, what the duece. Greetings, Gert!"
- "Greetings, Dandelion."
- "How did you know I was here?"
The poet straightened himself, and yanked his trousers up.
"I was in Wyszim," he said "I head about the striga,
and that you were wounded."
"I guessed where you would come to recuperate."
"I see you"re well now, are you?"
- "You see correctly, but try explaining that to Nenneke."
- "Sit. Let"s talk." Dandilion sat,
and peeped into the book lying on the lecturn.
"History," he smiled. "Roderick de Novembre."
"I've read him. I have."
"History was second on my list of favorite subjects
when I was studying at the Academy of Oxenfoot."
- "What was the first?"
- "Geography," said the poet, seriously.
"The atlas was bigger, and it was easier to hide
a demijohn of Vodka behind it."
Geralt laughed dryly, got up, and removed
Lunin and Tryss's
"The Arcane Mysteries of Magic and Alchemy"
from the shelf, and pulled a round-bellied vessel,
wrapped in straw from behind the bulky volume,
and into the light of day.
- "Woo-hoo-hoo." The bard visibly cheered up.
"Wisdom, and inspiration, I see,
are still to be found in libraries."
"Oh! I like this. Plum, isn't it?"
"Yes. This is true alchemy."
(drinking noises)
"This is a philosopher"s stone well worth studying."
"Your health, brother."
"Woo! It's strong as the plague!"
- "What brings you here?"
Geralt took the demi-john over from the poet,
took a sip, and started to cough,
fingering his bandaged neck.
- "Where are you going?"
- "Nowhere. That is, I could go where you're going."
"I could keep you company."
"Do you intend staying here long?"
- "Not long. The local Duke let it be known
I'm not
welcome."
- "Herrewood?" Dandilion knew all the kings, princes,
lords, and fuedal lords
from Jaruga to the Dragon Mountains.
- "Don't you give a damn."
- "You won't dare fall foul of Nenneke
or Melitele. The people would set fire to this castle.
- "I don't want any trouble. And I"ve been sitting here
for too long, anyway. I'm going south, Dandilion.
far South. I won't find any work here."
"Civilization...
"The Hell do they need a witcher here for?"
When I ask after employment
they look at me as if I'm a freak."
- "What are you talking about? What civilization?"
"I crossed Buina a week ago
and heard all sorts of stories
as I rode through the country."
"Apparently there are water sprites,
myriapodens, chimerea, flying drakes,
every possible filth."
"You should be up to your ears in work."
- "Stories. Well, I"ve heard them, too."
"Half of them are either made up, or exaggerated."
"No, Dandilion. The world is changing. Something is
coming to an end."
The poet took a long pull of the demi-john,
narrowed his eyes, and sighed heavily.
- "Are you crying over your sad fate as a witcher again,"
and philosophizing on top of that?"
"I perceive the disastrous affects
of inappropriate literature,
because the fact that the world is changing
occurred even to that old fart Roderick de Novembre."
"The changeability of the world, is, as it happens
the only thesis in this treatise you can agree with."
"But it's not so innovative you have to ply me with it,
and put on the face of a great thinker,
which doesn't suit you, in the least."
Instead of answering, Geralt took a sip from the demijohn.
"Yes, yes," sighed Dandilion anew,
"The world is changing."
"The sun sets and the Vodka is coming to an end."
"What else in your opinion is coming to an end?"
"You mentioned something about endings, philosopher."
- "I'll give you a couple of examples,"
said Geralt, after a moment's silence.
"All from two months, this side of the Buina,
one day I ride up and what do I see? A bridge.
"And under that bridge sits a troll,
and demands every passerby pays him."
"Those who refuse have a leg injured, sometimes both,"
"So I go to the eldermen,"
'How much will you give me for that troll?'"
"He's amazed. 'What are you talking about' he asked."
"'Who will repair the bridge if the troll's not there?'"
"'He repairs it regularly with the sweat of his brow."
"'Solid work. First rate.'"
"'It's cheaper to pay his toll' so I ride on,
and what do I see? A forktail. Not very big,
about four yards, nose-tip to tail-tip."
"It's flying, carrying a sheep in its talons."
"I go to the village."
'How much,' I ask, will you pay me for the forktail?"
"The peasants fall on their knees, 'No,' they shout,
'It's our Baron's youngest daughters's favorite dragon.'
'If a scale falls from its back,'
the Baron will burn our hamlet and skin us.'"
"I ride on, and I"m getting hungrier and hungrier.
"I ask around for work. Certainly it's there,
but what work? To catch a rosakan for one man,
a nymph for another. A dryad for a third."
"They've gone completely mad."
"The villages are teeming with girls,
but they want humanoids."
"Another asks me to kill a mercopteran
and bring a bone from it's hand because crushed
and poured into a soup, it cures inpotence."
- "That's rubbish!" Interrupted Dandilion
"I've tried it. It doesnt strengthen anything,
and it makes the soup taste of old socks."
"But, if people believe it, and are inclined to pay-"
- "I'm not going to kill mecopterens,
nor any other harmless creatures."
- "Then you'll go hungry,
unless you change your line of work."
- "To what?"
- "Whatever. Become a priest,
you wouldn't be bad at it with all your scruples,
your morality, your knowledge of people,
and of everything."
"The fact that you don't believe in any gods
shouldn't be a problem."
"I don't know many priests who do."
"Become a priest. Now stop feeling sorry for yourself."
- "I'm not feeling sorry for myself."
"I'm just stating the facts."
Dandilion crossed his legs
and examined his worn soul with interest.
- "You remind me, Geralt, of an old fisherman
who, towards the end of his life,
discovers that fish stink,
and the breeze from the sea
makes your bones ache."
"Be consistent. Talking and regretting
won't get you anywhere."
"If I were to find that the demand for poetry
had come to an end, I'd hang up my lute
and become a gardener, and I'd grow roses."
- "Nonsense. You're not capable of giving it up."
- "Well," agreed the poet, still staring at his soul,
"Maybe not, but our professions differ somewhat."
"The demand for poetry and the sound
of lute strings will never decline."
"It's worse with your trade."
"You witchers after all,
deprive yourself of work slowly but surely."
"The better and more conscientiously you work,
the less work there is for you."
"After all, your goal as a world without monsters."
"A world which is peaceful and safe."
"A world where witchers aren't necessary."
"A paradox, isn't it?"
- "True."
- "In the past, when unicorns still existed,
there was quite a large group of girls
who took care of their virtue
in order to be able to hunt them."
"Do you remember? And the rat catchers with pipes."
"Everyone was fighting over their services,
but they were finished off by alchemists
and their effective poisons, and then domesticated
ferrets and weasels. The newer animals were cheaper,
nicer, and didn't guzzle so much beer."
"Notice the analogy?"
- "I do."
- "So use other people's experiences,
the unicorn virgins when they lost their jobs
immediately popped their cherry."
(popping noise)
"Some, eager to make up for their years of sacrifice
became famous far and wide
for their technique and zeal."
"The rat catchers, well, you'd better not copy them
because, they, to a man, took to drink
and went to the dogs."
"Well, now it looks as if the time's come for witchers."
"You're reading Roderick de Novembre,
as far as I remember, there are mentions of witchers there."
"Of the first ones who started work some 300 years ago."
"In the days when the peasants used to go
reap the harvest in armed bands,
when villages were surrounded by a triple stockade,
when merchants caravans
looked like the march of regular troops,
and loaded catapults stood on the ramparts
of the few towns night and day."
"Because it was us, human beings,
who were the intruders here."
"This land was ruled by dragons,
manticores, griffons, and amphisboenas,
vampires, and werewolves, striga, kikimoaras,
chimerae, and flying drakes."
"And this land had to be taken from them, bit by bit."
"Every valley, every mountain pass,
every forest and every meadow."
"And we didn't manage that without
the invaluable help of witchers"
"But those times are gone, Geralt."
"Irrevocably gone."
"The baron won't allow a forktail to be killed
because it's the last dragonoid for a thousand miles
and no longer give rise to fear
but rather to compassion and nostalgia for times past."
"The troll under the bridge gets on with people."
"He's not a monster, used to frighten children,
"He's a relic, and a local attraction,
And a useful one, at that."
"And chimerae, manticores, and amphisboenas,
they dwell in virgin forests, and inaccessible mountains."
- "So, I was right. Something is coming to an end."
"Whether you like it or not. Something is coming to an end."
- "I don't like you mouthing banal platitudes,
"I don't like your expression when you do it."
"What's happening to you, Geralt?"
"I don't recognize you."
"Ugh, plague on it, let's go south as soon as possible,
to those wild countries."
"As soon as you've cut down a couple of monsters,
your blues will disappear
and there's supposed to be a fair number of monsters
down there."
"They say when an old woman's tired of life,
she goes alone and weaponless into the woods
to collect brushwood."
"The consequences are guaranteed,
you should go and settle there. For good."
- "Maybe I should. But I won't."
- "Why? It's easier for a witcher to make money there."
- "Easier to make money,"
Gerald took a sip from a demijohn.
- "But harder to spend it. And on top of that
they eat pearl barley and millet,
the beer tastes like piss, the girls don't wash
and the mosquitoes bite."
Dandilion chuckled loudly and rested his head
against the bookshelf on the leather bound volumes.
- "Millet and Mosquitoes."
That reminds me of our first expedition together.
To the edge of the world," he said.
"Do you remember? We met at the fete in Gulet,
and you persuaded me-"
- "You persuaded me. You had to flee from Gulet
as fast as your horse could carry you
because the girl you'd knocked up
under the musician's podium had four sturdy brothers."
"They were looking for you all over town,
(Sound of angry yells)
threatening to gouge you and cover you in pitch and sawdust,
that's why you hung onto me then."
- "And you almost jumped out of your pants
with joy to have a companion."
"Until then, you only had your horse for company."
"But, you're right, it was as you say."
"I did have to disappear for a while."
"And the valley of flowers
seemed just right for my purpose."
"It was, after all, supposed to be
the edge of the inhabited world."
"The last outpost of civilization."
"The furthest point from the border of two worlds."
"Remember?"
- "I remember."
- [Speaking As Himself] And there it is.
I raise to you my own meager demijohn
and wish you a very, very good night.
(Soft violin ends)